West Central volleyball gets a new coach

Published
12:00 am CDT, Tuesday, June 10, 2014

After back-to-back 30-win seasons, the West Central volleyball team lost two of the area’s best front-row players, as well as longtime coach Amy Davis. But the Lady Cougars aren’t ready to curl up and dye just yet.

West Central has a new head coach, Allyssa VanMeter, a former assistant volleyball coach at North Greene. When she’s not coaching, VanMeter is a hairdresser at Reflections Salon, located behind Lonzerotti’s Italian Restaurant in Jacksonville.

“I’m very nervous,” VanMeter said. “I’m nervous, but I’m excited. Big shoes to fill. Amy Davis was a very good coach. I’m looking to take the team to the next level — and hopefully not a rebuilding year, but a successful year.”

VanMeter has already been talking about the team with Davis, who’s expecting a baby in just a few weeks. The new coach got some good news when Ashley Stevens offered to be her assistant. Stevens, a teacher at Bluffs, had applied for the head coaching position.

VanMeter was a setter in college, and Stevens was a hitter, so things are working out.

“Everybody seems to be working really hard in open gyms,” VanMeter said. “So far I think we have a good group of girls.

“I see a lot of really, really good players,” the coach said. “A lot of good potential. We have some new players coming up that I think I’ll be moving up to the varsity team off sophomore bench. Just all around, we’ve got really good setters, a few good hitters — we lost a few big hitters last year and a libero, but I think those places will be filled pretty well with the practice we get this summer.”

VanMeter graduated from North Greene High School and later played for Lincoln College. She served as an assistant coach with the Lady Spartans varsity team last season, and coached the junior high team as well. VanMeter’s cousin Kristy Gebhardt coached the A-C Central volleyball team to a second-place finish in the IHSA state tournament in 2008.

VanMeter said she’s always wanted to be a coach.

“Volleyball is my passion,” she said. “If I could still be playing, I would be.

“I have a passion for youth,” VanMeter said. “I deal a lot with younger girls, and inspiring them not only to be good players, but good people. I just love coaching.”

She had a good experience in her first season at her alma mater.

“Last year we had a good season,” VanMeter said. “It was pretty much a rebuilding season. Coming in we had a new head coach last year as well. Everything went pretty smooth. The girls, we worked on a lot of positive attitudes and things like that.”

Last year also served as a test to see if coaching would fit in with VanMeter’s work schedule. It did.

“My clients are very, very great to me,” she said. “I’ve been in it for about six and a half years now, and my clients are very patient.”

VanMeter said she was thrilled to take the reins of one of the area’s winningest programs. “I have a lot to live up to, but I’m excited,” she said.

The coach said her team looks solid in the back row. The Lady Cougars are working to rebuild the front row, which lost two solid hitters in Kelsey Street and Victoria Miller. The team is playing in the MacMurray College summer league and plans a trip to a volleyball camp at the University of Illinois later this summer.

“I’ve been working a lot on offense and hitting and positions, and just really getting to know the girls and figuring it out,” VanMeter said. “Second week in, so … it’s pretty new.”